stedavies.com » Off topic

Brand Britain is fine

Stephen — Tue, 05 Jan 2010 00:48:29 +0000

The PR-otaginist, Dom Whitehurst, who is also a mate of mine, is annoyed. He feels Britain’s going down the swanny. Dom says, “British people don’t care about the UK any more. The era of national pride has passed and all that is left is a divided, self-interested populous with more loyalty to celebrities and brands than to British people.”

To me it sounds like something an old age pensioner with a faded memory and a pair of rose tinted spectacles would say when reminiscing about “the good old days” of years gone by. It’s easy to look back at the past with a utopian ideology of how things used to be so much better, nicer and simpler. But in my opinion it’s false and wrong on a number of levels.

When has Britain ever been in complete unison? I’m no historian but the countries within the UK have fought among each other for many years. Then it was bloody battles, now rivalry is revelled in a game of football. Including our apparent skill for, ahem, moaning, it’s the way it has always been.

Reading Dom’s post it seems his main gripe is that people aren’t courteous to one another on the Tube. Granted, but this is common knowledge to anyone outside of London. “Ya ganin to London like?” “Aye.” “Well, aah heard nee one tarks t’ya on the Tube. Ever!”

It’s hardly a reflection of the state of the nation. That said, you only have to remember the atrocity of the 7/7 bombings to know that when it *really* matters people will come together.

Facebook flaw? (look away now)

Stephen — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 21:56:22 +0000

Facebook has a really bad flaw. It’s so bad it could break up marriages and relationships. It’s not exactly a flaw of Facebook’s to be honest; it’s more of an application flaw but ultimately the fault lies with Facebook.

There’s a Facebook application called Zoosk, which is essentially a dating site within Facebook. You add the application to your profile, upload some nice pics of yourself and before you know it you’re cyber-flirting and have the ability to email other users of the application. Easy eh? And free too. If you don’t mind using Facebook as a dating tool, that is.

Like all Facebook applications, before you add it you can see which of your friends are currently using it. And this is where it gets a bit iffy and doesn’t take a rocket scientist to understand the point I’m trying to make.

Before you make any presumptions, however, bear in mind that people get invited to add applications from their friends all the time without paying any attention to them whatsoever. They never use them or look at them again. They just simply added it because they received a request from their friend.

But, still, if this is the case, Facebook should warn people about the application they’re about to install. I can’t imagine it being too pleasant seeing your husband/wife/boyfriend/girlfriend/whomever listed as a ‘friend’ using it.

Ouch!

Bye bye PRBLOGGER.COM

Stephen — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 22:06:15 +0000

Hello stedavies.com. After four and a half years of the PR blogger moniker it’s time for a rebrand. Thanks to Milo the old URL has 301 redirects set up to ensure any loss of Google Juice is minimal. Fingers crossed you won’t have to subscribe to the new feed as it’s been transferred over also.

For anyone who has me kindly linked to their blogroll I’d appreciate it if, for SEO purposes, you change it to the new URL. I’ll probably email a few people about it as well.

Onwards and upwards.

Social Media Counter

Stephen — Sun, 18 Oct 2009 12:22:53 +0000

Via Antony Mayfield

Those bitter Aussies

Stephen — Thu, 23 Apr 2009 06:03:09 +0000

From Brand Republic. “London advertising agencies have been made the butt of the joke in a new viral created by an Australian digital marketing strategist.

“The Melbourne-based strategist, known on YouTube as “Simontsmall” posted the clip in reaction to losing the account for the New Zealand vodka brand 42Below, to an unspecified London agency.”

He makes some valid points though.

If Carlsberg made T-Mobile adverts…

Stephen — Mon, 19 Jan 2009 23:33:23 +0000

…they would probably be the best T-Mobile adverts in the world.

From Mr Shorthouse.

UK journalists on Twitter

Stephen — Fri, 07 Nov 2008 11:09:37 +0000

Notice: This blog post has been updated one year later. There is a bigger and better list of UK journalists on Twitter here.

When I speak with regular PR folk about Twitter I often have a hard time convincing them of the benefits. It usually goes something like this, “Well you can talk to other people … and and … you follow them and, erm, sometimes other people add links to interesting things … and you can talk to someone directly using the @ icon.”

This conversation usually follows with me saying something along the lines of, “No, don’t leave. Wait, I haven’t explained myself properly. Wait! Honestly, it’s really good. I’m really sorry.”

Twitter isn’t something that immediately strikes you as anything good and explaining the benefits of it to someone who has never heard of it – particularly a pressed for time PR person – can be quite difficult.

Worry not my friends for there is a way around it. Show them something on Twitter that is related to them and their work and watch their eyebrows raise. What’s that you say? Well in my experience I often show them a ‘tweeting journalist’ (that’s a journalist who uses Twitter by the way) and immediately they begin asking questions.

(Note: I hope I don’t get in trouble for this like in I did here. Happy to remove anyone that doesn’t want to be on here.)

Add Me To Twitter

Freelance

E-consultancy

Chris Lake – http://twitter.com/lakey
Linus Gregoriadis – http://twitter.com/linusgreg
Graham Charlton – http://twitter.com/gcharlton

BBC

Tom van Aardt – http://twitter.com/tomVS
Richard Sambrook – http://twitter.com/sambrook
Tania Teixeira – http://twitter.com/taniateix
Jon Fildes – http://twitter.com/jonfildes
Declan Curry – http://twitter.com/declancurry
Daren – http://twitter.com/darenBBC
Dave Lee – http://twitter.com/davelee
Rory Cellan-Jones – http://twitter.com/ruskin147
Darren Waters - http://twitter.com/djwaters1

The Guardian

Neil McIntosh - http://twitter.com/nmcintosh
Charles Arthur – http://twitter.com/charlesarthur
Dave Hill – http://twitter.com/DaveHill
Stephen Brook – http://twitter.com/SDBrook
Cath Elliott – http://twitter.com/CathElliott
Bobbie Johnson – http://twitter.com/bobbiejohnson
Kevin Anderson – http://twitter.com/kevglobal
Jemima Kiss - http://twitter.com/jemimakiss
Kate Bevan - http://twitter.com/katebevan
James Anthony – http://twitter.com/jimboeth

Financial Times

Tim Bradshaw – http://twitter.com/tim
Chris Nuttall – http://twitter.com/ftchris
Peter Whitehead – http://twitter.com/peterwhitehead
Richard Waters – http://twitter.com/richardwaters
Kevin Allison – http://twitter.com/kevinallisonft
Kate Mackenzie – http://twitter.com/kmac
Stacy Marie Ishmael – http://twitter.com/s_m_i
Gideon Rachman – http://twitter.com/gideonrachman

The Telegraph

Marcus Warren - http://twitter.com/MarcusWa
Ian Douglas – http://twitter.com/IanDouglas
Shane Richmond – http://twitter.com/shanerichmond
Justin Williams - http://twitter.com/justin_williams
Catherine Gee – http://twitter.com/catherinegee
Claudia Beaumont – http://twitter.com/claudineb
Heidi Blake – http://twitter.com/HeidiBlake

Computing

Bryan Glick – http://twitter.com/bryanglick
Angelica Mari – http://twitter.com/angelicamari
Mark Kobayashi – Hillary http://twitter.com/markhillary

MSN UK

Peter Bale http://twitter.com/PeterBale
Katie King http://twitter.com/ktking
Jane Douglas http://twitter.com/msntechjane
Nik Taylor http://twitter.com/msntechnik
Monica Stylli http://twitter.com/msnstylemonica
Laura Snook http://twitter.com/LauraJSnook
Matt Ball – http://twitter.com/thisismattball

Birmingham Post

Joanna Geary – http://twitter.com/BhamPostJoanna
Marc Reeves – http://twitter.com/marcreeves
Richard Padgett – http://twitter.com/richardpadgett
Mike Hughes – http://twitter.com/mikehughes
Tom Scotney – http://twitter.com/TomScotney
Joanna Geary – http://twitter.com/joannageary

Manchester Evening News

Sarah Hartley – http://twitter.com/foodiesarah
Christina McDermott – http://twitter.com/MissCay

Middlesbrough Evening Gazette

Julie Martin – http://twitter.com/jules_27
David MacLean – http://twitter.com/davidmaclean

Journalism.co.uk

J Townend – http://twitter.com/JTownend
Laura Oliver – http://twitter.com/LauraOliver

Other

Azeem Ahmad – http://twitter.com/Azeem_A (Environmental News Online)
Paul Cockerton – http://twitter.com/paulcockerton (Lancashire Telegraph)
Jo Wadsworth – http://twitter.com/jowadsworth (Croydon Advertiser)
Chris Henwood – http://twitter.com/thisismattball – (Birmingham Mail)
Sam Shepherd – http://twitter.com/SamShepherd (Bournemouth Daily Echo)
Andy Walker - http://twitter.com/andywalker82 (Birmingham Sunday Mercury)
Alan Burkitt-Grey – http://twitter.com/alanburkittgray (Global Telecoms Business)
Jono Russell – http://twitter.com/Jono (SPIN World Cricket Monthly)
Mark Ogier – http://twitter.com/MarkOgier (Guernsey Press)
Charlie Elise – http://twitter.com/charlie_elise (The HR Director)
Katherine Hannaford – http://twitter.com/clashcityrocker (T3)
Kirsty W – http://twitter.com/zimjourno (unknown)
Andrew Lim – http://twitter.com/andylim (CNET UK)
Rachel Wilson – http://twitter.com/rachaelwilson (Environmental News Online)
Martin Stabe – http://twitter.com/martinstabe (Retail Week)
Chris Green – http://twitter.com/chrisgreen (IT PRO)
Patrick Smith – http://twitter.com/psmith (paidcontent)
Alison Gow – http://twitter.com/alisongow (Liverpool Daily Post)
George Hopkin – http://twitter.com/GeorgeHopkin (Johnston Press Plc)
Steve O’Hear – http://twitter.com/sohear (ZDNet)
Michael Moran – http://twitter.com/blockbusterbuzz (The Times)
Jack Marshall – http://twitter.com/JackMarshall
David Woodward – http://twitter.com/davidjwoodward (Director Magazine)

Vote for us!

Stephen — Thu, 20 Mar 2008 12:12:11 +0000

Seriously, it will take you two seconds! Webitpr’s entered its Social Media News Release into the North East Digital Awards, a local award ceremony held up here in Newcastle for digital initiatives. The award we’re going for with the SMNR is Best Use of Emerging Technology which is under the Digital Innovators category. But you don’t have to look through them all to vote – HERE’S THE DIRECT LINK. Simply click on it and it will take you directly to our entrants page and all you have to do is click on the ‘vote’ button. Easy.

The first 100 people that vote for our entry will receive a round-the-world cruise courtesy of us and the runners up will receive a brand new Sony Vaio laptop also. Sorry, just kidding – you won’t receive anything but we’ll be eternally grateful and it’s good karma on your behalf too.

Two things

Stephen — Thu, 13 Mar 2008 16:42:09 +0000

PRBLOGGER 2.5

Come on in. Take your shoes of first though and mind the carpet as you may have noticed I’ve been decorating. Well, not me specifically but thanks to WordPress wizard, Matt Brett, the blog’s had a few tweaks here and there. Namely the font (PRBLOGGER’s rolling with Arial these days); a Twitter plugin to replace the moblog (I might have mentioned Twitter once or twice lately); new navigation buttons (hover over ‘em and watch ‘em glow); new archives page (almost three years long now) and a host of other back end stuff.

This baby’s purring like a lolcat.

SOCIAL MEDIA: THREAT OR OPPORTUNITY FOR TRADITIONAL MEDIA?

That’s the question that’ll be on everyone’s lips at the CIPR HQ on the 26th of this month where I’ll be on a panel alongside the BBCâ€™s Head of Editorial Development and Multi-Media Journalism, Pete Clifton, and Communities Editor of Telegraph.co.uk, Shane Richmond. Should make for an interesting discussion and one that hopefully stirs the audience up a bit because, quite frankly, I think (except for those in my RSS reader) the UK PR industry is lagging a bit. I know I’m not alone thinking this either.

Thanks to Daljit Bhurji for putting it together. Tickets are all sold from what I gather by Daljit. Should be good.

Tweeters: Stop spamming my Facebook!

Stephen — Thu, 06 Mar 2008 17:41:23 +0000

Okay I’m going to have a bit of a rant here. I kinda feel a bit iffy writing this as it looks like I’m complaining about some of my mates, but I’m not… Well, I am, but not in a bad way. Take this blog post as a friendly rant (hence the smileys) – you know, like someone you really really like but just does one little thing to annoy you – but a rant none the less. Here goes: If there’s one thing that reeeeaaaalllly annoys me on Facebook, it’s when my contacts update their status updates using Twitter.

Aaaaarrgghhhh!

Seriously, dude, maybe you should start using Facebook status updates in the way in which Mr Zukerburg intended? I follow you on Twitter and we’re friends on Facebook so we’ve obviously got a good relationship going on. But, dude, you’re inundating me with your updates and I’m reading them multiple times.

Aaaaarrgghhhh!

What do your Facebook friends think? I’m talking about the non-geek, non-Twitter users here. They must think you’re insane, yes?

Case study: (names changed to protect the guilty)

Bob has been using Twitter to update his Facebook status updates for three weeks now. Bob’s friends log in to Facebook and see this crap:

Bob is twittering: @joeblogs Yeah!

Bob is twittering: This baby tastes good.

Bob is twittering: @joeblogs No, I saw it last week!

Bob is twittering: @samboy I’m introducing you to @joeblogs. Say hello to each other.

**Bob’s friends collectively think Bob’s lost the plot.**

Aaaaarrgghhhh!

Seriously, I’m just having a bit of pokey fun here but I’m sure I’m not the only one here that thinks the same?

Anyone? Anyone?